


A Good Idea...? Riiiggghht...

by Sally M (sallymn)



Category: The Sentinel
Genre: Birthday, Friendship, Gen, Humor, Series 2
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-13
Updated: 2009-12-13
Packaged: 2017-10-04 09:32:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 694
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28492
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sallymn/pseuds/Sally%20M
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's Blair's birthday...</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Good Idea...? Riiiggghht...

**A Good Idea...? Riiiggghht...**

****

"Your idea, Jim," the Mad Scientist Once Known as Blair Sandburg said gleefully, waving the scrap of post-it note on which his Sentinel, in a fit of friendship-induced insanity, had scrawled those fateful words. "All your idea. _Man,_ and it's a good one..."

****

It really _had_ seemed a good idea at the time, something a bit different from the deluxe fishing rod and the beer that Jim had lashed out on first. A bit personal, a bit... _meaningful,_ without being maudlin.

****

He must have been out of what would be left of his mind after Sandburg got through with him.

****

Jim sat on the steps, watching Blair gleefully fuss and fret and arrange and fetch and carry everything he wanted for the day. He stared at his friend, his partner, his avidly enthused torturer for a long minute, wondering why he had the only Mad Scientist in the galaxy who bounced as he got madder, then at the oddly sinister - if totally incomprehensible - paraphernalia littering the kitchen: leather straps and gloves, silk scarves, old socks, bailing twine, wooden poles, a strangely creepy variety of body lotions and butters, soaps, weird foods, weirder definitely-_not_-foods, plus the usual ominous collection of flora, fauna and dirt something-or-others that Blair kept insisting were medicinal, and the entire contents of a demented housewife's cleaning cupboard.

****

Jim shook his head, and told himself again how it had seemed a good idea at the time.

****

He really didn't want to think about what Sandburg wanted to do with the cheese grater and the egg-whisk. The feather-duster was... probably kinky, okay, but the sandpaper and screwdrivers in the same pile - knowing Sandburg as he did - would probably prove even kinkier.

****

Nah, the kid was in earnest here. Jim had to give him that. This was about science and learning and... and a good idea at the time.

****

But then there was the 3-CD set of sound effects. Which was probably better than the tapes of Arabic pop music that lay silent and threatening on the table, or the _12-CD _set of... Jim craned a little, turned up his sight, and read the label in wordless disbelief. _Wiggles songs_??? Did he want to know why Sandburg _had_ Wiggles songs?

****

Well yeah, more than he wanted to hear them.

****

At the back, there was several bottles of strange, unidentified... stuff. None of it booze (he should be so lucky, this was _Sandburg_) but all of it... well, stuff. And what looked like half a dozen tubs of... frozen Jell-O?

****

Frozen _Jell-O???_ He didn't want to know. Knowing Sandburg as he did, the amount he didn't want to know was growing to terrifying proportions.

****

He groaned.

****

"Jim?" His own private tormenter looked up from playing with the equipment that Jim hadn't even got to with big, anxious, puppy-dog eyes. "You _are_ okay with this man, aren't you? You know you can take it back if you want."

****

Yeah, he knew that. He'd feel like a shit doing it today of all days, but...

****

"I wouldn't say a word, man. It's up to you, you know it's always been up to you..."

****

Like anything was ever up to him these days.

****

"But you _did _write it, no limits..."

****

He sighed, but nothing on earth would have persuaded him to say no now, and his Mad Scientist knew it.

****

"It'll be great, man," Blair bounced up, looking around with delight. "The best present ever. You'll love it, really. And just _think_ what we can learn with all this..."

****

Riiiiggghht, what they - or rather, what _Blair_ \- could learn. That was the whole point, wasn't it? The best present he could give his devoted anthropologist buddy was the chance to learn, to study, to... test.

****

Test _him_.

****

What had possessed him to even _think _the fateful words _"I O U One Days Testing, Chief. No Limits,"_ was a good idea at any time? Jim groaned, and put his head in his hands.

****

This was going to be a _looooonnngg_ day. Thank God it only came once a year...

****

And _next_ year, he'd buy Birthday Boy _six_ fishing rods... and a beer.

**

  
**\- the end -**   


**


End file.
